Dear CDD Partners and Friends
My service to the State of Vermont as Deputy Commissioner for Child Development ends on August 30, 2019 so this is my last message to you from that vantage.
These past two months have allowed for a lot of reflection about the time I have had the honor and privilege to hold that position here in Vermont. I am gratified to believe that over these ten years, building on many years before that, we have made real progress. We have improved policy and increased resources for child development and family support in the early years. Our progress has been steady and not all places can make that claim. We’ve connected the dots between early childhood services across sectors to create pathways that make navigation among those services for families a little easier. We embrace and value a mixed delivery system for early care and learning. We are far from done. We’ve learned together, and keep learning, that change is necessary, and change is hard for those of us making our way through it. But positive change makes the world better for little kids and families so we need to keep at it.
One important thing we did was articulate a simple shared vision - to realize the promise of every Vermont child. That’s our commitment to ensuring that young children in our state grow up happy, healthy and ready for a lifetime of learning. We keep coming back to that vision as a North Star in building an innovative and integrated system of early childhood services that make sense – holding a common vision really matters.
We’ve done lots of things to advance the vision and the six goals of the Early Childhood Framework and Action Plan created in 2013. ( A celebration of major accomplishments from a CDD perspective is attached) It hasn’t been easy – we haven’t always agreed on which way was best or what progress looks like but we’ve maintained focus and kept at it and what’s most important is that while we’ve kept at it we’ve continued to build a community, a coalition, a movement, across Vermont that is working hard to pull together in the same direction. That’s the best part, for me, of these ten years – pulling together. Nothing that has been achieved or overcome or moved forward has been achieved or overcome or moved forward by one person – everything has been the result of passionate people who care deeply about the well-being of young children and families in our state coming together with common purpose to find the way forward collectively. Relationships make a critical difference in child development and I would argue, relationships make a critical difference in creating and implementing good policy. I have had the incredible opportunity to work close to the epicenter of much of that movement. I treasure the relationships that have developed and deepened with state colleagues, local partners, childcare providers, legislators, and families. It has been an amazing ride.
Many people have been asking me what’s next? I’ve decided to take the leap of starting an independent consulting business to see what good work I can find to keep improving policy and practice in early childhood. I’m staying in Vermont because its my home - I love it here and I believe it is a great place to be a kid and raise a family and be part of a caring community. I have so much confidence and belief in the collective energy and wisdom of all the people I’ve been working with inside and outside of state government here - I know that progress for children and families will continue.
If you want to reach me you can do that through Heartofachild.vt@gmail.com or at 401-864-2879. Please keep in touch. Send me an email so I have your contact info. Please keep doing all the good things you do for children and families each and every day.
All My Best
Reeva
Something to Celebrate:
What We Did Together – CDD’s Significant Accomplishments 2009 - 2019
Provided full continuity of Child Care Financial Assistance Program (CC FAP) payments without a pause supporting families and childcare providers through the crisis of Hurricane Irene and its aftermath in 2011. Child Care Licensing staff mobilized to help childcare providers impacted by the flood relocate and later rebuild in order to preserve childcare capacity in affected communities.
Revised 15 year-old child care regulations between 2012 and 2016, creating clear, objective, developmentally appropriate standards that are reasonable, measurable, achievable, and enforceable. Creating guidance manuals (first ever) to help childcare providers and licensing staff understand the purpose behind certain regulations and interpret regulations with consistency.
Strengthened Child Care Licensing Unit capacity to provide technical assistance to childcare providers and would be childcare providers and consistently monitor and enforce regulations. This vibrant and effective team has added five Licensing Field Specialist positions over this period so that we can ensure that childcare providers are supported to do their best work and that children are safe, healthy and thriving in regulated childcare.
In 2013 CDD was an active leader in the development of a shared Early Childhood Framework and Action Plan for Vermont that lays out six goals to unify Vermonters in our efforts to realize the promise of every Vermont child. The Early Childhood Action Plan provides specific strategies to ensure progress toward achieving the six goals of the Framework. Both documents reflect a shared responsibility to provide a good start for all Vermont’s children and a belief that all Vermonters benefit when our youngest citizens and their families are thriving. These documents continue to guide a collective impact effort to advance a common agenda to increase the well-being of young children and their families in our state.
Collaborated with a team that included multiple state agencies, notably, Health, Human Services and Education, as well as private and philanthropic partners to win a 5 year federal $36.9 million dollar Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge Grant in 2014. The goal of the Early Learning Challenge grant program was to help states build a high-quality and accessible early childhood system, so all young children in Vermont, especially those with high needs, succeed in school. Between January 2015 and December of 2019, the integrated Vermont Team focused on four key strategies:
- Improving quality and access of early learning and development opportunities;
- Investing in a highly skilled, early childhood workforce through professional development;
- Empowering communities to support young children and families; and
- Strengthening our capacity to ensure we are making a difference.
Through that shared work we leveraged current successful efforts in Vermont including the Vermont Early Childhood Framework and Action Plan, produced positive impacts that lasted well beyond the grant period, and produced measurable short-, medium- and long-term results. CDD successfully led or co-led 14 of the 24 projects included in the grant. The RTT-ELCG Implementation Team won a Governor’s award for this work.
Worked with other partners and stakeholders to strengthen and right size the Building Bright Futures (BBF) State Advisory Council and Regional Councils. BBF is Vermont’s early childhood public-private partnership established by law to monitor the state’s early care, health and education systems and to advise the Administration and Legislature on early childhood policy. BBF serves as a statewide backbone organization, bringing early childhood stakeholders together to work collectively toward a coordinated, collaborative, and integrated early childhood system. It is responsible for monitoring progress on the six goals of the Vermont Early Childhood Framework. CDD is BBF’s primary state funding partners and participates on both the Council and Executive Committee. CDD staff are members, and often public co-chairs on all BBF Committees. The DCF Deputy Commissioner for Child Development co-chaired the BBF Council from 2015 – 2019.
Built Children’s Integrated Services from a vision of what integrated service delivery across disciplines and local service providers could be for young children and families into an operational model of an innovative and forward-thinking program that is breaking new ground for best practice and collaboration among service providers in communities and between local provider groups and state staff. This means that the right services reach the most vulnerable pregnant women, young children, and their families at the right time - early in the life cycle - promoting optimal development in a critical growth period and building protective factors in families that mitigate the need for more costly interventions later in life. As of January 2019, there are CIS Teams fully integrated in every region of Vermont.
Convened the first Vermont Home Visiting Alliance supported by the Pew Foundation in 2014 – in close partnership with Maternal and Child Health (MCH) in Vermont Department of Health. The Alliance recommended and supported Home Visiting Legislation. MCH and CDD developed and promulgated Home Visiting regulations for Vermont to implement the legislation. On-going collaborative work on Home Visiting is a critical AHS strategy to prevent and/or mitigate the impacts of adverse childhood experiences. Together MCH and CDD have generated a pioneering approach to Home Visiting services as an integrated continuum that focuses both state and local energy on a child and family centered approach to serving pregnant women, young children and their families in their homes. The continuum is called Strong Families Vermont Start at Home. The Vermont Home Visiting Alliance will reconvene in 2019 to build on this foundation.
Brought the Strengthening Families Framework to Vermont and infused it into work across the Agency of Human Services and beyond, continuing to champion building protective factors in families as a primary prevention strategy to reduce child abuse and neglect and mitigate the negative impacts of adverse childhood experiences.
Helped to develop and implement legislation - in partnership with the Vermont Agency of Education and community stakeholders - supporting universal, publicly funded access to ten hours of high-quality preschool (UPK) experiences for all three and four year old children in Vermont in 2015. This established the most expansive state-wide support for publicly funded prekindergarten in the country. Working collaboratively, the two agencies began implementation of the complex law within 5 months of passage. AHS, represented by CDD, and AOE have continued to successfully implement and evaluate UPK services in the state over the past four school years. Implementation of Act 166 has led to an overall improvement in the quality of early care and learning services for preschool children across our state. Since early implementation in 2015, participation in publicly funded UPK has increased by more than 2,500 three and four-year-old children in Vermont.
Partnered closely and well with Parent Child Centers individually and the Parent Child Center Network generally maturing the state-to-local provider relationship into true and respectful collaboration. One outcome of this was the creation of Parent Child Center Master Grants in 2016 reducing the number of CDD grants to 15 PCCs statewide from 3-5 per PCC to a single grant per center.
Transformed the Early Childhood and Afterschool Professional Development System (EC&AS PDS) in 2016. Using research about best practice as a guide, we worked to ensure that training and professional development for the early childhood and after school workforce is aligned with and incorporates established standards for programs and professionals in Vermont. The transformation also enhanced coordination among and within components of the EC & AS PDS to increase consistent access to high quality, locally available learning opportunities that lead EC & AS professionals toward expanding knowledge and competence and achieving credentials and post-secondary credits and degrees.
Improved and increased the Child Care Financial Assistance Program (CCFAP) as a strong, viable and well managed benefit program increasing access to affordable high quality childcare for low income children and families and other vulnerable populations. We have participated actively with federal partners in the reauthorization of the Child Care Development Block Grant (also known as CCDF) and are leading the nation in compliance with newly implemented federal standards and requirements and the establishment of a forward leaning program that is family friendly and fair to providers and advances two generation policies that benefit children’s development while strengthening the financial stability of families through education and employment. In 2019, CDD proposed a five-year plan to redesign CCFAP to reduce unaffordable co-payments for families and support high quality early care and learning. Full implementation of the plan, anticipated in 2021, will support parent participation in the workforce, improve the financial stability of families, and support children’s growth, development and learning.
Increased participation and program progress in Vermont STARS quality rating and improvement system for early care & learning and afterschool programs. As part of the RTT-ELCG, CDD contracted with Child Trends to conduct a robust validation study and evaluation of Vermont STARS. Results of that evaluation are informing an evolution of the system to strengthen and streamline it. In fall of 2016 the first phase of the evolution will bring all licensed programs into Vermont Stars, effectively uniting licensing regulation and quality improvement into a single continuum. As this occurs CDD will be launching a public information campaign to ensure that parents are well informed about the positive impacts of increased quality on children’s development and learning. The campaign will promote Vermont Stars as an effective tool in making an informed choice about the best program for their child.
Through all of these projects and systemic improvements and innovations, CDD’s dedicated, hardworking and talented staff have maintained a strong commitment to customer service for Vermont’s families and our many community partners who serve them, keeping the day to day work of the Division flowing on an even keel. There is much to celebrate about the decade just past and more progress, innovation and integration to anticipate in the years ahead.